Daniel White Hodge, a
blogger with ConversantLife for the past four years, is a producer with a Ph.D.
In his twenties he had production credits on Bone Thugs-N-Harmony's first
album, E 1999 Eternal, as well as helping to score
the first two seasons of New York Undercover. With a Ph.D. from Fuller Graduate
School of Intercultural Studies, he is now the director of the Center for Youth
Ministry Studies and assistant professor of youth ministry at North Park
University in Chicago. This interview first appeared in Christianitytoday.com.

How has your relationship with
hip hop changed over your life?

I was
a listener as a kid, back in the late 1970s when I first heard The Sugarhill
Gang and Run DMC and started wondering how they put those words together. Until
high school, I was more of a consumer. In high school I became a participant.
In my early twenties, I was involved as a producer. Now I am looking at how God
is involved in almost every facet of hip-hop culture, which has become more of
a lifestyle, not just something in [a musical] corner.

Quentin Tarantino’s (QT) new
film, Django, has elicited many
responses across the spectrum on race, gender, class, and even God. The film
has created a type of blog/ essay sensation and many were talking about it long
before it was even released. QT is no rookie to controversy; critics have
railed on QT for too much violence, use of the word “nigger,” sexism, and a litany
of other issues with his films. Since Reservoir
Dogs, QT has become accustomed to controversy around the issues of race,
class, and gender. Thus his latest, Django,
is no less causing quite the stir—particularly in the cultural/ Black studies
academic community.

As I read the incoming tweets and
Facebook chatter, I realized this was going to be bad. A pro ball player
killing his girlfriend and then taking his life; to add to the multifaceted
problem, he goes to his place of work to commit suicide. I have to admit, I was
not that surprised at the events. Appalled? Yes. Saddened? Of course; at least
two sets of families have lost their loved ones. Angered? Yes, of the continued
culture of silence that we as men—particularly Black and Brown men—live in on a
daily basis. While I am not a minimalist and do not want to abate the sequence
of events that led to this tragic killing, men who live in silence and do not talk
about and deal with their problems are volcanic time bombs waiting to erupt; it
is just a matter of time upon whom they will erupt on and how large that
eruption will be.

There I sat, anxiously awaiting
the final scores for the women’s gymnastics all around. Gabby had done an
amazing job and so did the rest of her team. She had already won a gold medal
for her team performance, but now, was the individual gold. It finally came in.
Gabby had won! Now, in times past I normally could care less about the Olympics;
they take up valuable TV time and make me miss my favorite shows. But, since I
got married, a lot of “things” have
changed in my viewing appetite—this of course being one of them. I was floored.
She actually won! Amazing. Stupendous. Unreal. And then, the racial construct ideology
hit me seconds later. I wondered, how long it would take before Gabby’s racial milieu
becomes the topic of conversation. So, I decided to do a little experiment, I
grabbed my phone and set the timer to see how long it would take before
something about Gabby’s “Blackness” (and all the social pathologies associated
with being “Black”) would come to the forefront to shadow her success.

Within African American culture,
it is widely know that Christianity is the main religion, culturally speaking,
for African Americans. Yet, how do other religious practices such as atheism, Gnosticism,
and even unbelievers get dealt with? How does a Black atheist navigate a
culture with such strong religious mores? Check this video clip out below—from the
National Black Programming Consortium and internet series on Black people Don’t:…--
as the conversation continues on issues such as these. Fascinating stuff!

Theory Hazit is a profound rapper discussing some serious
issues of pain. Hazit has been known to engage with controversial subjects, and
the video below is nothing less than stellar.

What Hazit does is contextualize pain within a Hip Hop
context. He grapples with the current issue of bullying and being GLBTQ through
music. If you’re not familiar with Hip Hop’s deep connection with pain, check
out this excerpt:

Hip Hop defines suffering in one
of five ways. 1) Suffering because of circumstances that you cannot control
(e.g. financial hardships, family drama, physical ailments, mental
disabilities), 2) suffering for a cause in which you believe deeply in (e.g.
socio-political issues, social justice concerns, racial matters), 3) suffering
because of the individual personhood (e.g. people hate you because you have
money, fame, prestige, or simply doing well in life), 4) suffering as a result
of something you as a person have done in life and or something someone has
done to you (e.g. past mistakes, current mistakes, life errors or for something
good that you did but are now being persecuted for it, and or the good and bad
within intimate relationships), and 5) suffering as a result of social,
political, and or spiritual oppression (e.g. beginning a new mantra of belief
or creating new paradigms for people to see the world differently and society
not dealing well with that).

While I plan to get deeper into this particular subject, I
felt it important to at least engage, albeit briefly, on the subject matter.

The Earth cracked, just a bit, for many Black pastors and
Christians when President Obama announced he was in support of gay marriage.
This tore open a slice in the gender constructs within Black cultural milieus
that has, especially in Christian circles, gone unengaged with for decades. Sexuality, sexual orientation, its twin cousin
gender performance is a continual issue for many Black Christians. The idea of
how do I act as a man; how do I act as woman; role performance; femininity;
masculinity; sexual awareness, are all issues that tend to be seen as very
binary for Black Christians—generally speaking. For example, you are either
having sex within marriage, in a heterosexual, monogamous relationship or you
are “sinning.

Twenty years ago one of the
largest insurrections occurred in Los Angeles California. I was 18, angry from
the tirade of police brutality, enraged from a lifetime of racism growing up in
Texas, prepared to give my life for justice, and in shock to the “not guilty”
verdict just handed to me on the closed circuit television in my senior English
class. I could almost literally see the world around me turn red. I was infuriated
that, once again, White’s would “win” and Blacks—for that matter all ethnic
minorities—would have to take a backseat, yet again. The anger rose, filled the
room, others looked around, and in an almost joint accord we—the student body—decided
to go out and discuss this issue of racism in a more “public” setting. One by
one, each of the classrooms began to empty out as word of the verdict spread.
My friend Larry pulls out an American flag and begins to burn it. My other
friend Tyrone picks up a trash can and throws it toward the quad. Another
friend of mine begins to yell, “No justice, no peace!” Friends of mine are
visibly crying. And the mood of everyone is that “How much longer can we take
this?” I corralled several friends of mine; we packed up heavy weaponry, our
bullet proof vest, and made our way down into South Central Los Angeles to
physically manifest our disgust, not just with the not-guilty verdict, but with
the continued mistreatment of ethnic minorities in American history.

Faith and religion within the
public sphere has an interesting personality. A personality which has race and
culture at the center fueling its character. Therefore, with the recent rise in
fame of Denver Broncos’ quarterback Tim Tebow, I find it interesting how his
faith and spiritual notions are being played out in the public arena. Allow me
to first say that I have no problem with him “performing” his faith in a public
manner. Yet, the frenzied imposition of meaning
on the power of his “religious convictions” (e.g. the Broncos are winning as a
result of his prayers) includes, but transcends what Wade Clark Roof refers to as
civil religious rhetoric in his article American
Presidential Rhetoric from Ronald Reagan to George W. Bush: Another Look at
Civil Religion. This type of religio-political rhetoric tends to create
myths and fantasy within the public arena, which in turn create meaning, cultural
mores, and social reality for the people who believe it. Myths are powerful
types of vehicles for any people group and society.

Mentoring is messy. There is no
other way to say it. If you are doing it right, then it is very mess. Moreover,
the time it takes to be involved in a person’s life while they live out their
own drama can sap all of your energy. Yet, every once in a while we find a
person like Conrad Johnson who embellishes all of the finesse of a great mentor yet is
able to instill the rigors of real life into his mentees like a drill sergeant
does with their cadets. Someone who is able to live with the person, in their
drama, yet pushes them not just through it, but beyond it; that was Conrad
Johnson.

If you are not familiar with whom
Conrad Johnson is, then you must see the new film directed by Mark Landsman (Skylab 2005; Peace Of Mind 1999), and produced in help from Jaime Foxx, titled Thunder
Soul. It chronicles one of this countries great music educators who
developed a high school stage band into a world renowned jazz-funk powerhouse
in the early 70’s. Johnson was able to do what many other teachers, were not able
to do, which was instill self-respect, identity, and self-esteem within his
students in order to create a legion of band members who would reshape the very
essence of high school stage bands.